A Thing
by Jojo6
Summary: Jack unintentionally meets part of the family Sam would rather he not have.


Disclaimer: Stargate SG-1 is an original MGM, Greenburg/Anderson, Gekko, Top Secret, Kawoosh! production.  
Any material relating to Stargate SG-1 is for entertainment only, and is in no way meant as an infringement on copyrights. In other words, I own nadda. 

A/N: This goes nowhere, guys. Really. Sorry. 

Sidenote: If anyone can be bothered, what does PWP mean? I'm relatively new to the fanfic genre, so I'm still working out the terms. I know WIP means work in progress, and POV means, duh, point of view, and m/f means the obvious, and so on. Just can't work out what PWP. P***-Without-Point? _Piece_-without-point? Piece-without-plot? Am I getting close? 

* 

* 

* 

Daniel glanced up from his desk, adjusted his glasses. '' Hey, Sam, you going home?'' 

Sam edged into the room after hovering uncertainly in his doorway until he'd noticed her. '' Mmm. Well, no. My cousins are taking me out tonight.'' She tapped her fingers on a pile of books, realised she was fidgeting and forced herself to stop. '' I was wondering if you'd like to come? Protect me from my family, so to speak.'' Yup, that was good. Nice and casual. Very... smooth. 

Daniel grinned. '' Are these the same cousins your dad was telling me about?'' 

She narrowed her eyes. She'd had this suspicion all along, of course. One minute her father had been complaining that she didn't have enough colour, she was working too hard (this coming from the man who'd just returned from a four month undercover mission) and the next minute he'd been smiling broadly and telling her he had to make a phone call. One day later, she had her maternal cousin James calling her up saying that he, Louisa and Eric would be in town and they'd like to see her. 

'' I imagine so, Daniel. I only have the three of them.'' 

'' In that case, Sam, I think you'll understand if I, regretfully, decline. It's a good thing we've got tomorrow off,'' he added, raising his eyebrows at her significantly and closing the book in front of him. He slid it onto the pile at his left elbow and then reached for another, older one. 

'' I'm not drinking,'' Sam said, primly. 

'' Learnt your lesson?'' 

'' Exactly what did my father tell you, Daniel?'' she demanded crossly, then couldn't believe she was letting Daniel, _Daniel_, wind her up like this. '' Oh, never mind.'' 

He chuckled. '' Have a nice night, Sam.'' 

'' Yeah.'' She sighed deeply. Then decided she would have to pull out the big guns. '' Daniel?'' 

'' Yes?'' he answered vaguely, head already lowered of his next piece of reading material, pen and notepad on hand. 

'' Remember when you promised me if I ever needed anything... you'd be there for me?'' 

'' When did I promise you that, then?'' 

New Year's Eve 1999, after an entire bottle of tequila, but that was beside the point. '' If you really are my best friend, Daniel, you'd come with me tonight. You'd like Louisa. She's... hot.'' 

Daniel finally looked back up at her, and she didn't know what had alerted him - if it was the crack about him being her best friend, or the fact that she now appeared to be setting him up with her cousin. '' Sam? What's going on? They're family.'' 

Sam huffed. '' I don't want to go. I want to stay _here_. I want to _work_.'' 

She couldn't believe she'd just said that. In tones of a five year old, no less. This was beyond embarrassing. 

Thankfully, Daniel's temperament wasn't such that he would pick up on the ridiculous statement. '' It's only for a few hours.'' 

'' No, no, you don't understand my cousins. It won't be for a few hours. I'll be lucky if I'm sober tomorrow afternoon!'' 

'' I thought you weren't going to drink.'' 

'' If you come with me, I won't.'' 

Her friend put down his pen and folded his hands in front of him, assessing her thoughtfully. '' Just what'll be in it for me, then?'' 

'' My undying gratitude?'' 

Pursing his lips, he considered. Then shook his head, picked up his pen. '' Night, Sam.'' 

'' Okay, next time the Colonel demands you quit work off-world, I'll stick up for you.'' 

That got his attention. '' And you'll do my cooking for three missions? No, four.'' 

'' Deal.'' Damn, she knew she should have haggled, but she was desperate. '' Sticking up for you, four cooking details.'' 

Smiling happily, Daniel slid his chair back and stood up. '' Okay. Give me ten minutes and I'll meet you up top. I take it your cousins are coming to you?'' 

'' Yeah. We'll pick you up - you're on the way.'' 

'' Just what do your cousins do, anyway? Jacob didn't mention.'' 

'' Well, they're Taylors.'' 

'' Tailors? As in, clothes tailors?'' 

'' No, no. Sorry, I forget, sometimes that you're... Taylors are my mother's relations. They're all in the Air Force. All of them,'' she emphasised. 

Daniel's eyes crossed slightly. '' All three of them?'' 

Hadn't she just said that? '' Yup.'' 

'' Are they... scary?'' 

'' In what sense?'' 

'' Like Jack used to be.'' 

As far as Sam was concerned, the Colonel could still be scary, but that was from a military point of view. From an emotional point of view, he was still scary, but she didn't really want to consider that one overmuch, even if it was part of the reason she hadn't gone straight to him after Janet had refused to protect her from her cousins. 

'' No. Not at all,'' she reassured him, lying through her teeth. Apart from the fact that both of her male cousins had decidedly chequered pasts (Eric hadn't exactly volunteered to join the Air Force and James' file was so censored most of it was incomprehensible), she also knew that Louisa had taught her to pick locks, hot wire cars and had given her a very explicit description of sex when she was thirteen. 

Nope. Not scary at all. 

* 

Jack swung into Teal'c's room at about half past six and raised his eyebrows at his Jaffa friend. '' Seen Daniel or Carter?'' 

'' I believe they left half an hour ago, O'Neill,'' Teal'c said, pausing in his occupation of lighting candles. '' Was there something you needed from them?'' 

He tapped his nails on the door jamb. It was Friday. It was early evening. Where else would his scientist duo be but at work? '' Do you mean... they've gone home?'' 

'' I believe so, O'Neill.'' 

Well, this was a turnabout for the books, Jack decided. He shook his head at Teal'c. '' No, nothing I needed from them. Don't suppose you want coffee, do you?'' 

'' I was just about to begin kel-nor-reem.'' 

'' Yah. I can see that. Never mind. Guess I could head on home...'' Not that home was a really entertaining place, even if it had that new box of Simpsons episodes to watch. 

Teal'c nodded respectfully and returned to lighting candles. '' Good night, O'Neill.'' 

'' Night, Teal'c.'' 

Jack wandered off down the corridor, hands in his pockets. His left hand played with a rubber band he'd pulled off some blueprints earlier on in the day, while his right toyed with a button off of Carter's shirt that he'd 'forgotten' to give back to her a few months before. Truth be told, Jack was at a bit of a loose end. While he by no means spent as much time on base as Carter and Daniel - who, let's face it, practically lived there - he did spend more than the requisite nine 'til five when they weren't off-world. Hell, he loved his job. He was 2IC of one of the most secret facilities on Earth - who wouldn't get a major kick out of that? 

_Hmm, Major..._

He wandered past her lab again, then turned around and walked inside. Everything was shut down for the night, all the little blinky lights turned off and the machines still. Her laptop was closed, her papers all in order. Sitting on top of one of said piles of papers was a photo. He picked it up and smiled faintly - teenage Sam and some friends of hers. Okay, judging from the general blondeness in the photo, and the similarity between teenage Sam and the other girl, probably relatives. He turned the photo over - _Me, Lou, James and Eric '82._

Jack winced slightly. 1982? She looked, what, fourteen, fifteen in the photo? Man, she was pretty young. How old had he been in '82? Didn't bear thinking about. 

He sighed and put the photo back. He hated being reminded of the significant differences in their ages. It always, without fail, led him to consider all the others odds that were against them. Her looks, brains, career. His... lack of looks, brain, career. Okay, so he wasn't exactly paper bag material, but being 'distinguished' only got you so far. Further than ugly, but not as far as hot. He missed being hot. 

He blew out a breath and meandered over to one of her latest... big... wiry machine-type things. It sure looked complicated. Imagine - all that coming out of her brain. She knew where to put those little clips, and those little wires, where to put the mechanics and the computer board thingies... 

She was waaaaay smarter than him. 

Grunting, Jack decided hanging in her lab was bordering on obsessive so he left, headed down the corridor, took a left and swung by Daniel's lab. Didn't want to lavish too much attention on one member of his team's.... lab. 

Daniel's place was a whole lot messier, but just as confusing. Occasionally, Jack could grasp what Carter was talking about. More occasionally than he let on, actually, but that was purely a training tactic that he had yet to break. Act stupid and everyone will underestimate you. People who knew him well understood that - he wasn't sure Carter and Daniel did yet, but Teal'c definitely got it. So, Carter's stuff sometimes made sense, if she explained it to him using metaphors and fruit. But Daniel's... never in his life would Jack comprehend mythology, gods, the need to know twenty-however-many languages. Why, why, why? 

Still, Jack was fond of his geeks. More than fond of one of them, but that wasn't the point. They were both complicated as hell but they completed his team, balanced out the brawn with brains. 

Jack would do nothing to break up SG-1. Absolutely nothing, even if it disrupted his personal life and pissed him off in the process. Hammond understood that, Carter understood that. If Daniel understood it then he knew more than he was letting on. Teal'c so totally knew where Jack was coming from (the guy didn't sleep, after all, and must have noticed Jack's less-than-platonic Carter-watching while they were off-world). 

'' Colonel?'' 

He turned, smiled at the Doc. '' Hey, Fraiser. Something I can do for you?'' 

Her eyes swept the room, searching, and she held up a box of medication. '' Daniel requested these, but I see Sam must have got to him.'' 

Curious, Jack tilted his head to the side. '' Got to him?'' 

'' Hmm. Sam's cousins are visiting and she didn't want to go out with them alone.'' The Doc rolled her eyes expressively. '' Unfortunately, my shift starts at six tomorrow morning, so I suppose her next victim was Daniel. Never mind. SG-1 are on downtime tomorrow?'' 

Distracted, Jack nodded. '' Yeah, yeah. They are.'' 

'' Well, I'm sure Daniel will be in at the crack of dawn. I can give them to him then.'' She turned to go, but Jack stopped her by calling out. 

'' Do you know where they've gone?'' 

'' The way Sam put it, every bar in a conceivable radius.'' She raised her eyebrows. '' Jacob described them as the Taylor Terrors.'' 

The name rang a big bell in the way it only did when they were talking about Carter. Since he had every single conversation he'd ever had with her neatly filed away in the part of his brain that dealt with women he loved, he put the name to the conversation and came up with the right answer. '' Taylor? Her mom's side of the family?'' Taylor cousins. He recalled a conversation with Jacob about them, actually. 

'' Yes.'' Janet was already hovering, edging out the door. '' Colonel, I really have to...'' 

'' Sorry, yes, go, go.'' 

She scurried off, leaving Jack to think. 

Carter and Daniel, out on the town. Somehow, Jack couldn't quite picture it. He picked up a small statue on Daniel's desk, turned it around. It had a hideously smiling face, looked like the damn thing was mocking him. 

'' Creepy,'' Jack labelled it, putting it down a little harder than necessary. 

He guessed he'd go home, then. 

* 

Jack searched the crowd once more, then shook his head. He couldn't believe this. Daniel was so going to be doing cooking detail until he retired. 

He pulled out his cell phone, made his way over to a 'quiet' corner, relatively speaking, and checked the screen. Five missed calls? How could he have missed five calls? And didn't the damn thing vibrate? 

Then again, since the walls, tables, and people were currently vibrating in time with the very loud music, Jack didn't think he could have felt an earthquake. 

He dialled Daniel's cell and pressed it against his ear, one hand clasped over his free ear in an effort to hear properly. 

'' Hello?'' 

'' Daniel?'' he shouted. 

'' Jack! Where are you?'' 

'' I'm here. I can't see you.'' 

'' We're in the back corridor. Head across the room, there should be a door with STAFF ONLY sign on it.'' Then he hung up. 

Jack gave his phone a dirty look. 

Muttering 'excuse me's and 'sorry's and 'get the hell out of the way's, Jack made his way through the crowd, wishing he was anywhere else but there. Sure enough, the STAFF ONLY door appeared, like a sign from heaven, and Jack shoved his way through it. The moment the door closed behind him, he heaved in a sigh. 

The corridor stretched out, white with hideous synthetic lights, and he could see not only Daniel, but also Carter and two of her three cousins lounging against a wall. 

'' Jack!'' 

Jack refused to shout back, instead walking towards them in what he knew as a threatening manner. Carter was steadfastly staring down at the floor, flushed colour on her cheekbones, and the two guys next to her were shifting uncomfortably. '' Daniel. Major,'' he said shortly. '' Do you know what time it is?'' 

Carter winced, glanced up at him. He was slightly surprised to see that she was wearing a lot of eye makeup. Not unattractive, certainly, but it was different to what he was used to. Then again, if the makeup was causing him problems, the outfit should have given him a heart attack. 

Peripherally, Jack had already been aware Carter had legs up to her armpits. Great legs, too. Long, smooth and pale. Of course, he'd known that by occasionally glimpsing her in the locker rooms, or when they'd been forced to strip to the bare minimum off-world. He hadn't known just how great they'd look framed by a short, black skirt. 

Forcefully, Jack refused to let his mind dwell on her cleavage. It would just end up horribly. He comforted his brain with the knowledge that he could have nice little dreams about the cleavage when he finally got back to bed. 

He turned a steely eye on the two men, tall, blonde, athletic looking. Several years his junior. He'd known Carter's family was comprised of Air Force, on both sides. Jacob had told him once, oh, ages ago. Judging from the look on these boys' faces, they also knew who Jack was. Which meant they were subordinates. Terrified ones (which were, by the way, the best kind). 

'' Gentleman,'' he greeted sternly. 

'' Sir,'' they muttered, eyes lowered. 

'' Just what's going on here, Daniel?'' 

'' Louisa's in there,'' Daniel said, nodding to the door. He glanced at a miserable Sam, then continued. '' She, ah, started a fight. They want us to pay for damages but they don't accept credit cards and we don't have enough cash on hand.'' 

If anything, the Carter-Taylor contingency looked even more embarrassed. 

Jack sighed. '' Right.'' He knocked on the door and waited, refusing to see any humour in the situation at all. 

* 

Sam wanted to die. Curl up and die. The earth to swallow her, as she curled up and died. At this moment, she was up for anything. Anything at all. Goa'uld invasion would be preferable. She couldn't believe Louisa had got her into this mess. Again! That was the crux of the matter. This always happened. Sam couldn't count the number of times she'd been in a complete mess because of Louisa and her over-enthusiastic partying. 

The Colonel wasn't speaking to them. They followed him like naughty children to his Jeep and silently climbed in, despite the fact that they were rather squashed in the back. Daniel got to sit in the front, while Louisa and Sam had to make do by half sitting on Eric and James. 

The journey back to Daniel's was painfully silent, broken occasionally by stammering attempts from Daniel to get some conversation going. 

Colonel O'Neill parked near Daniel's apartment and got out. '' I'll be back soon. Don't touch anything.'' 

He slammed his door and walked with Daniel to the front entrance. 

'' Oh, man. You work with him?'' Louisa complained. 

'' Shut up.'' 

Sam's cousin sighed. '' Look, I'm sorry, but that... woman was asking for it.'' 

Sam clenched her teeth together and refused to comment. 

'' Lou,'' Eric said peaceably, '' whether or not that woman asked for it is beside the point. I think what Sam's trying to convey is she'd rather not have called out the man whom she works under to bail us out of the mess you got us into.'' 

'' I know.'' Tentatively, Louisa touched her cousin's hand. '' I'm really sorry, Sam. You know how my temper is.'' 

It wasn't in Sam's nature to hold a grudge, no matter how hard she tried. Sensing the honest guilt and regret in Louisa's voice, Sam turned her hand over and gripped her cousin's hand tightly. '' I forgive you. It's just... I really like this guy.'' 

James nudged her. '' _Like_ like?'' 

'' Don't be twelve, James,'' Louisa snapped, leaning forward to look at Sam's profile more closely. '' He's your CO, right?'' 

She nodded. 

'' In deep... radar... telemetry.'' 

Sam's mouth twitched uncontrollably at the dripping sarcasm in Louisa's tone. She could see the Colonel was coming back so she hurriedly tried to get her face into some kind of order. 

'' He certainly looks.... like a deep radar telemetrist,'' Louisa snorted, also watching the return of the man in the leather jacket. '' You didn't tell me he was hot.'' 

Sam bit her lip and looked down at her lap, saw the state of her skirt and tried to yank it down some. '' Shut up, Louisa.'' 

'' You think he's hot, don't you?'' Despite herself, Sam nodded her head slightly, causing Louisa to whistle in low tones. '' That's a big no-no, Sam.'' 

'' I know,'' Sam whispered urgently. '' Shush. He's back.'' 

The Colonel opened his door, glanced at the four of them in the back. He nodded at Eric. '' You. In the front. Now,'' he snapped. 

'' Yessir.'' 

Eric climbed out of the car and the three that were left breathed a deep sigh of relief and spread out in the back seats. Sam put her seat belt on, much to the amusement of Louisa who, at Sam's glare, also put hers on. Sam switched her attention to James who was already hurriedly fumbling for the security device, humouring her. 

Thinking about it, she didn't think she'd ever seen her cousins so compliant, which, she guessed, had something to do with the waves of disapproval radiating from the front seat. 

Oh, man, he was never going to speak to her again. 

'' Colonel O'Neill?'' 

Sam froze. What was Eric doing? Was he talking? Didn't he know that talking to Colonel O'Neill when he was in a bad mood was a really bad idea? 

'' What?'' 

'' We're all very sorry for disrupting your night like this.'' 

Staring grimly down at her strappy sandals, Sam waited, metaphorically on the edge of her seat. 

'' Which one are you, then? Eric or James?'' 

'' Eric. Eric Taylor. Major Eric Taylor,'' he added, glancing over his shoulder at Sam and winced slightly at her expression. '' I'm sure Uncle Jake's warned you about us.'' 

'' Yes. He has. I thought he was joking.'' 

Eric grinned, his typical sense of humour kicking in. '' Uncle Jake's just glad we're not his kids. He got the well behaved Taylor genes in Sam and Mark. Though Sam did go through that......'' 

'' Eric!'' 

'' No, Eric, please, do go on.'' The Colonel glanced in his rear view mirror and smiled at his 2IC. '' Any stories you have of Carter will go a long way into getting her back into my good books.'' 

Flushing horribly, Sam returned to glaring at her shoes. 

'' Uh... okay. There was the time she disappeared for three weeks around about her sixteenth birthday.'' 

Sam closed her eyes uncontrollably. '' You are so dead.'' 

'' Where did you go?'' the Colonel asked in surprise. 

'' No one ever found out,'' Eric said mysteriously, obviously enjoying himself immensely. 

'' Next story!'' Louisa commanded, who'd been let into Sam's secret years ago and knew very well no one else was going to find out. '' Tell him about the system Sam set up in the academy so we could get men into our rooms without being caught.'' 

'' Jesus Christ! I'm never speaking to any of you again!'' 

The Colonel was, by this stage, grinning. '' Oh really? Just what system was that?'' 

'' A combination of roof sentries, walkie-talkies and codes. We never got caught once while we were at the academy.'' 

'' That's it. You are no longer my cousins. I disinherit the lot of you.'' Sam slumped back in her seat and tried not to look like she was sulking. She was thirty-two and way too old to feel this teenage. '' I can't believe my father thought it would be a good idea to see you again. He knew exactly what would happen.'' 

'' God bless Dad,'' the Colonel chuckled, in a considerably better mood. 

'' Well, you can have him if you want!'' Thank God they were nearing her house, that was all she could think. She could get up in a few hours time, sneak out of the house and hide in her lab until her embarrassment had died down. So thinking, Sam picked her bag off the floor and pulled her keys out in preparation, then dropped the bag by her feet again. This way she could leg it out of the car and be in her house without any fumbling around, aware that the Colonel was watching her from his car. 

Louise leaned forward and peered at Colonel O'Neill. '' Deep radar telemetry, hey? At least that's more impressive than the cover ups James used to bring home. What was your last one?'' 

James cleared his throat. '' Louisa,'' he warned, losing all traces of humour in his voice. 

Louisa sighed the sigh of someone who's life was an open book. '' Sorry. Blame it on the vodka. Carry on with Sam humiliation.'' 

'' Oh, we _so_ are not.'' Sam leaned forward and grabbed Eric's ear, pinching tightly. '' Or I will phone up your CO and tell him that you have the hots for his wife.'' 

'' Oooh,'' James and Louisa exclaimed, giggling. 

Eric squeaked. '' Okay, okay, I promise. No more Sam-stories. Just.. let go of my ear, dammit!'' 

Sam released her cousin and sat back, just as Colonel O'Neill indicated and swerved to park in front of Sam's house. 

'' Last stop, guys. Out you get.'' 

* 

Okay, so he had to admit, pulling Carter and her friends out of a scrap at three in the morning hadn't been the trial he'd worked his temper up to. In fact, watching the four of them walk sedately towards Carter's house, Jack couldn't help but grin inanely. He could see his 2IC's mouth working hard and every so often, she reached out and mock-smacked one of them. Clearly they were getting in trouble for humiliating at her in the car. 

Oh, Jack was so gonna get their numbers off file and ask for more details. 

Deciding it was distinctly gross of him to be still watching them - all right, all right, Carter's legs were causing him a little trouble - Jack got a move on and drove off. 

He was about halfway home, stopped at set of lights, when he noticed the bag. Reaching behind and picking it up, he didn't recognise it (not really surprising - it wasn't as if he saw a lot of women's handbags), but assumed it must have been either Carter's or Louisa's. 

Since he didn't know when Carter's cousins were going home, he knew it was up to him to turn around and deliver it back at Carter's house. Rolling his eyes, he found a quiet stretch of road and did a U-turn, continued back to his 2IC's house. The bag, now sitting on the passenger seat, got a couple of very dangerous looks for this extra waste of time. 

He was nearly there when something shot out in front of his car. Something small, brownish, decidedly animal like. Jack emergency braked and dropped his head down onto the wheel. Whatever the animal had been (little Timmy's dog or a mangy fox), it scurried off hurriedly with its life, thanks to Jack's swift reactions. 

Checking in the mirror for any traffic, Jack leaned over and started to pick up the contents of the bag that had fallen open at the rapid braking, shoving everything into the bag. God, this woman carried a lot of crap. Numerous items of makeup - lipstick, eyeliner, eye-shadow, some kind of foundation stick - tissues, mirror, fluff, purse (huh, that looked familiar), small sewing kit, cell phone... okay, this was so Carter's bag, he decided. He checked the car mirror again, saw he was still alone - well it was the small hours of the morning - and sat up. Flipping open the purse with little thought to the morality of the matter, he smiled at the picture she kept on prominent display. 

It was really nice, actually. The four of them, in civvies, at Cassie's birthday party last year. His eyes went first to Carter, as they always did, in whatever situation they were in. Actually, he didn't need the picture to remember what she'd looked like. Tight, navy blue shirt and low-slung black linen trousers. She got this look in her eye when she was surrounded by people she loved - this relaxed, happy glint that was infectious. Looking at the photo now, he could see it in all their eyes, even his, but that might have been something to do with the fact that he'd been 'forced' to put his arms around Carter. She, as the shorter of the four of them, had to stand in the front, with him, Danny and Teal'c behind her so they could fit into the picture. At least, that was what Doc Fraiser had said. 

Since he knew Sam wrote on the back of her photos, he pulled it out and turned it over. Yup, just what he thought: _Me, Jack, Teal'c and Daniel, Cassie's b-day party, '00._

Jack? 

He grinned. Cool. 

Jack saw the lights before he heard the car horn and, hurriedly, he put everything down, raised his hand to say he was moving his ass, and quickly finished the journey to Carter's house. He jogged up the path and knocked lightly, and swiftly on the door. 

It was James who answered the door. Jack held up the bag silently and James grinned. '' Sam's, right? In her misery she must have forgot. The girls are already in bed, Louisa's bunking in Sam's room while we get to share the spare room.'' He rolled his eyes expressively. '' Times like this I forget how much Eric snores.'' 

Jack's mouth quirked. Despite himself, he was starting to like Sam's cousins. As Jacob had, strangely, assured him he would. '' Okay. Tell her... I'm not really mad at her.'' 

'' Tell her yourself, tomorrow. Call her or something. She'll need to hear it from you,'' James explained, leaning on the door, apparently not suffering from his night out in the slightest. '' Sam hates disappointing men she respects. It's why she was so quiet most of the journey home.'' 

'' Huh.'' Well... it was all he could manage. '' Okay. I'll... call her.'' Even if he _never _called her. Hopefully, he could just allow himself to forget and there would be no awkward phone calls to face up to. 

'' I'll tell her to expect it.'' 

Oh... damn. Jack sighed. '' Right. See you... around.'' 

'' You too, Colonel. It was really nice to finally meet you.'' 

Finally? 

Jack was on the verge of leaving, but that 'finally' smacked of... of something. '' Just who have you heard about me from?'' 

James grinned - clearly, Carter got that smile from her mother's side of the family as well. '' Sam and Uncle Jake, of course. Uncle Jake is convinced she has a thing for you, but don't go telling Sam I told you that.'' 

Jack blinked. 

If anything, James' smile got bigger. '' Speechless, Colonel?'' His eyes were wide and innocent. 

Too innocent. 

It was alarmingly akin to the look Sam gave him when she was trying to get out of cooking detail. '' Okay,'' he started threateningly, a finger raised in preparation for a good dressing down. 

'' It's all right, Colonel. Just call her tomorrow, sir.'' 

Then he closed the damn door on him. 

Jack _was_ speechless. Just what kind of family was this? Jacob was sending his daughter out with lunatics because he'd decided she wasn't getting out much, then he was telling said lunatics that Carter had a.. a.. 

Well, he knew she cared about him. Just like he cared about her. Of course, caring could be construed many ways. He cared about the environment, for instance. Didn't mean he wanted to marry it. 

Not that he wanted to marry Carter, of course. Because she so wouldn't want to, in the first place. Things weren't like that between them. Were they? Would she? Jacob was making up that whole 'thing', right? 'A thing for him' suggested... she, um, well she... liked him liked him. As in she wouldn't mind... 

Which was just ridiculous. She was intelligent, beautiful and smart and young and smart and beautiful and.. and... 

A 'thing for him'? 

Obviously, that could be construed several ways too. 

Jack's brain was laughing at him. 

It was four in the morning, Jack pointed out to himself, just as he pressed his thumb and forefinger to the bridge of his nose where a lovely headache was just starting. It was waaay too early to be having these kinds of thoughts. He would go home, dream about cleavage, and everything would be better in the morning. 

In the morning, when he had to call her. 

Doh! 


End file.
